


Miraculous

by starklyman



Category: The West Wing
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-19
Updated: 2017-10-19
Packaged: 2019-01-19 11:50:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12409779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starklyman/pseuds/starklyman
Summary: “This is a beautiful piece of music, do you know this?”





	Miraculous

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own the West Wing

He’s 8 and Joanie is 12 and it’s their parents’ monthly date night. Their date night that had once occurred every several months but had turned into a regular monthly thing the day Joanie turned 11 and was deemed old enough to babysit, at least for a few hours.

She’s been taking piano lessons for 6 years now and likes to think of herself as classical music aficionado. Though Josh has proven his disinterest in the subject time and time again, she nevertheless sits him down on the floor, the record player sitting between the two of them.

“I wanna watch TV.” His voice is whiny and petulant, but Joanie just shushes him, her focus on starting the record.

“You’ve gotta listen to this, Josh. Trust me, you’ll like this one.”

She starts it and turns the volume up, the sounds of piano echoing throughout the room.

He watches her. Watches her close her eyes, an awed smile on her face. She raises her arms and begins doing the conducting motions like she’s been practicing for months. Suddenly she stops and opens her eyes.

“Listen, Josh. This part right here, listen.”  
The woman’s voice gets higher and higher and the instruments crescendo and it takes his breath away. And suddenly he thinks that piano and classical music might not be as boring as he thought.

She’s watching him, smiling.

“It’s just... miraculous.”

He really can’t help but agree. They listen to it 14 more times that night.

It’s 4 months later and Joanie is babysitting again and there’s popcorn on the stove and she’s putting Ave Maria on the record player again at his insistence and telling him how Schubert was crazy and neither of them notice the smell until it’s too late and she’s yelling at him to go outside and that she’s right behind him and it’s years before he can bring himself to listen to that song again.


End file.
